About 75 goats and sheep were bundled together in New Jersey ready for auction and slaughter. The night before the auction, something happened: they escaped!
According to local news reports, the goats and sheep escaped through an unsecured gate at the Hackettstown Livestock Auction around 9:30 p.m. Although a few were captured the same night, others were still roaming in the morning.
Locals are blaming another goat for helping his mates to escape the slaughterhouse. Named Fred, the goat had allegedly escaped from the same auction about a year ago. He apparently kept showing up in town and was seen a few hours before the goats and sheep at the auction escaped.
Allegedly, Fred showed up again at the facility and headbutted the gate holding the animals that had escaped in a bid to release them again.
The auction house manager Bouwe Postma tried shooing Fred away, and the sighting made them conclude that he was the culprit of the mass escape.
“It was him [last night],” Postma declared. “I think he’s the culprit. He must have banged that fence and let him out last night. I’m almost positive. He must have put a lot of force into that.”
It was not the first time goats escaped. Just a week before, 100 goats in Idaho escaped, in an incident called “Goat-a-Palooza 2018.”